For centuries, mankind has looked to provide solutions to personal overheating. Modern air conditioning is quite sophisticated, but is only applicable in confined quarters such as an office, a home or a car. Moreover, despite its efficiencies, modern air conditioning still requires significant power consumption.
Hand held fans have been utilized for ages. Any large leaf or other flat, lightweight surface could suffice. Expanding paper or silk hand fans became popular for their ease of carrying and instantly unfolding into a suitable surface for the user to waft back and forth.
The earliest electric fans were introduced in around the 1880's. The first such fans were essentially a blade attached to an electric motor. These early fans were dangerous and expensive and generally had exposed blades and motors. Thereafter, motors were encased and fan cages appeared, but these fans were very cumbersome. As technology increased, fans became smaller, more efficient and provided design improvements, such as oscillation.
The present invention provides a personal cooling fan powered by solar energy in a dual configuration such that when a wearer is exposed to full sun and heat in an open environment, full capacity is achieved with a front facing adjustable and positionable fan powered by a front photo-voltaic cell array and a rear facing adjustable and positionable fan powered by a rear photo-voltaic cell array. The rear photo-voltaic cell array can also power an auxiliary smaller fan that cools the entirety of the photo-voltaic cells to maintain optimal efficiency. In environments where size is a concern, such as for example, in outdoor sporting events, graduations, concerts and the like, the present invention provides an alternative configuration wherein the rear platform and photo-voltaic cell array can disengage and slide underneath the front platform area to effectively curtail the footprint almost in half. The snake-like arms that connect the fan assemblies can be positioned down and out of the way leaving only the front portion of the headwear to cool the front area of the wearer, which in situations such as these, should be adequate. These advantages of maximizing efficiency of the solar power, providing flexibility of the fan arrays and dual modality of footprint have not heretofore been taught or suggested by the prior art
Inventors have attempted to provide headwear incorporating personal fan cooling. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,893,356 titled, AIR CONDITIONED HEADWEAR HAVING CONVERTIBLE POWER MODULE which issued Jan. 16, 1990 discloses “headwear, including all forms of caps, hats, hard hats, visor type caps, to include a switchable power module capable of converting an electric motor driven air moving means from battery power to solar power wherein the solar power is removable.”
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,672,968 titled, HEADWEAR WITH BUILT-IN COOLING MEANS which issued Jun. 16, 1987 discloses, “[a] headpiece with two built-in fan units for cooling the face and back of the neck of a surgeon while he or she is performing surgery. Each of the fan units has a fan blade mounted perpendicularly within a cylindrical housing in close tolerance with the inner wall of the housing and includes an electric motor having a drive shaft to which the fan blade is attached. The motor and fan blade assembly is supported by vanes interconnecting it with the cylindrical housing which extend radially outwardly from the axis of the assembly. The headpiece has a frame that fits a wearer's head like a hat and supports the two fan units, one in front and the other in back of the frame. The frame also supports a power source for the two fan motors and other components of circuitry which permit adjustment of the speed of each motor for optimum cooling effect. The fan units are pivotally mounted and manually adjustable to different angular positions for control of the direction of airflow in front and back of the wearer's head.”
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,680,815 titled, SOLAR POWERED HEADWEAR FAN which issued Jul. 21, 1987 discloses, “[a] self contained personal cooling device. It is a one-piece modular component which is pre-wired and interchangeable between different hats. The components of the modular unit are employed in the unit to effect total body cooling by evaporation and forced convection. The unit is powered by photo-voltaic energy. The cooling effect of this modular device is maximized by incorporating air vent slots adjacent to the fan motor assembly to increase the force of air delivery.”
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,551,857 titled, HOT WEATHER HAT which issued Nov. 12, 1985 discloses, “[a] hot weather hat having a solar-powered Peltier-effect thermoelectric device mounted to a headpiece such that the cold surface of the thermoelectric device is in communication with the forehead of the wearer and the hot surface of the thermoelectric device is in communication with ambient atmospheric air. A thermally conductive strip provides conductive heat transport between the forehead and the cold surface. A finned radiator provides radiative and convective heat transport between the hot surface and ambient air.”
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,290,292 titled, COMBINED SOLAR POWERED FAN AND HAT ARRANGEMENT FOR MAXIMIZING AIRFLOW THROUGH THE HAT which issued Nov. 6, 2007 discloses “an apparatus includes a hat including a unitary brim that is provided with spaced inner and outer edges defining a slope traveling downwardly and outwardly towards the outer edge. The hat further includes a raised head region including a pair of spaced and coextensive apex regions and a trough intercalated therebetween. The hat has an oblong opening disposed at the rear of the head region for allowing air to flow outwardly from the head region at a rate equal to at least twice an inlet air flow rate. A motorized fan is mounted to a front side of the head region and subjacent to the trough. Solar panels are connected to a top surface of the brim. A sleeve is formed along an interior surface of the hat that extends from the solar panels and is connected to the fan for housing electrical leads coupled thereto.
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,032,291 titled, SOLAR POWERED HEAD COOLING DEVICE which issued Mar. 7, 2000 discloses, “an apparatus for providing solar powered air circulation to the face and upper body of the user. A means for mounting photoelectric cells to the apex of the top of a hat is provided which cells are connected by wire to a directionally selective fan which is located under the brim of the hat. The fan receives air transmitted through a conduit under the brim of the hat which has its air inlets on the lateral edges of the brim of the hat. The fan is also provided with a horizontally movable axle means whereby it is partially rotatable in the horizontal axis to selectively distribute the air. An alternative embodiment is provided wherein the components of the present invention are assembled into a modular semi-flexible frame which can be attached to an existing favorite cap by means of hook and loop material thereby providing a portable cooling unit which can be easily attached to various hats
In another example, U.S. Pat. No. 8,480,365 titled, CAP HAVING PIVOTBLY MOVABLE FAN which issued Jul. 9, 2013 discloses, “[an] article of headwear having a body with a hole extending completely through bottom and top surfaces thereof and a cooling device mounted to the article of headwear. The cooling device is mounted via a mounting ring received at the hole which mounts the cooling device to the body at the through hole to permit selective manipulation of the cooling device about a horizontal axis in a range between 0 to 360 degrees relative to the headwear body and the mounting ring.”
There remains, therefore an unmet need for a device that provides power through optimized photo-voltaic cells to an independent and manipulable fan array such that the wearer has complete control over fan speed and positioning to provide ultimate cooling effects. Moreover, by providing a mounting surface and airflow and an optional third fan for additional cooling to the photo-voltaic cell surface, efficiency is optimized such that the solar power provides sufficient energy to power the entire array of cooling fans. Additionally, a dual modality is provided for instances where a sacrifice in power is an acceptable trade-off for a smaller footprint.